This experiment investigated pain-related avoidance behaviour in a context of competing goals. Participants (N = 56) were presented trials of two different tasks of which one could produce pain. They were free to decide whether or not to perform trials of these tasks. In half of the participants a competing goal was activated by instructing them that they would receive a monetary reward corresponding to the number of pain task trials actually performed (competition group). In the other half of the participants no competing goal was installed (control group). Results showed that the competition group showed less frequent avoidance behaviour than the control group. Furthermore, the association between pain-related avoidance behaviour and fear of pain was smaller in the competition group than in the control group. The findings indicate that the emergence of pain-related avoidance behaviour depends upon the motivational context, and that the association between pain-related fear and avoidance is not stable. This study has implications for our understanding of disability, and points to the need to consider avoidance behaviour within a broad context of multiple, often competing, goals.